Employee Engagement Best Practices: Sustaining Motivation and Productivity
Engaged employees are good for business. Employee engagement levels are directly linked to productivity, retention, and, ultimately, profitability. Engaged employees take their work seriously and are motivated to do the best they can for your organization. So, today, we’ll share some employee engagement best practices that could help you.
By using these effective employee engagement strategies, you can motivate your staff to perform at their best and therefore improve outcomes across your organization.
But what exactly is employee engagement? Why is it important? And how do you implement an effective employee engagement strategy?
In this post, we will discuss 10 employee engagement best practices for sustaining motivation and productivity. Let’s go! 🚀
What is employee engagement?
Employee engagement is the extent to which your employees are connected to and invested in your organization. It tells you how committed they are to their work and how motivated they are to see your business succeed.
Engaged employees want to do well, and want the organization as a whole to thrive. They communicate well with colleagues and express interest in opportunities for growth.
They are often innovative and excellent problem solvers with a drive to overcome challenges.
On the other hand, employees who have low levels of engagement at work avoid challenges and are poor communicators. They avoid accountability and view their work as something they need to do rather than something they want to do.
Employee engagement can be separated into three distinct but connected elements:
✨Physical – Employees put a lot of energy into their day-to-day duties.
✨Emotional – Employees feel an emotional connection to their work and put their all into it.
✨Cognitive – Employees are engrossed in their work and feel mentally stimulated.
When an employee is engaged on all three levels, they are more invested in their work and your organization will reap the benefits.
Why is employee engagement important?
Whether it’s a content marketer writing a blog on AI use cases in insurance, or a salesperson running a live product demo for your latest software launch, engaged employees can make all the difference.
When engagement is high, your employees are more likely to go above and beyond expectations to see your business succeed. 💡
As well as this, there are many benefits of an engaged workforce, which we will explore in this section.
Increased productivity, creativity, and innovation
Engaged employees create a company culture where people are more productive, think critically, and put forward innovative ideas for business growth. This critical thinking and innovation can lead to better decision-making, greater efficiency, and growth.
Greater employee satisfaction and retention
Engaged employees experience more job satisfaction. They experience less stress and burnout, and therefore absenteeism rates are lower. When employees are engaged, they are satisfied with their work and this leads to higher employee retention levels.
Customer experience
Employee engagement levels have a significant impact on your customer experience. Disengaged employees are unlikely to put considerable effort into ensuring your customers are happy.
On the other hand, engaged employees are more likely to have excellent customer orientation skills and to go the extra mile for your customers and your business.
Reputation
As well as having a positive impact on customer experience, satisfied employees are more likely to speak highly of your business to friends and family. A positive workplace culture with high levels of employee engagement can have a lasting impact on your reputation.
No business wants its employees to go around complaining about how awful it is to work for them.
Word spreads fast, so it’s important that you consider what your employees might say about your company, as well as your reputation amongst your customers.
Business outcomes
So, with satisfied and engaged employees, your customer experience is better, your reputation is positively impacted, and your employee turnover is low.
Not only that, but your employees are more productive, creative, and innovative. This will have a direct impact on your business outcomes.
In fact, did you know that organizations with an engaged workforce outperform their competition? According to Gallup, companies with high levels of employee engagement are 23% more profitable than those with low engagement levels. 💡
10 Employee Engagement Best Practices
Clearly, employee engagement levels are influenced by the intrinsic motivation of the employee in question. With that being said, there are some practical steps organizations can take to sustain motivation and productivity among their employees.
Keep reading to explore 10 best practices for employee engagement.
1. Create a strong company culture ✅
Think of company culture as the personality of an organization. It can be defined by the shared values, attitudes, behaviors, and characteristics of the workplace.
A strong company culture is built over time, and can hugely impact your employee engagement efforts.
In a solid and vibrant company culture, people are more likely to enjoy their work and perform at their best. When their goals and values align with those of the organization, employee performance and motivation increase.
2. Hire people who share your company’s values ✅
Once you are clear on your values and have created a strong culture, it is important that you carefully consider who you hire to be on your team.
In order to sustain high levels of employee engagement, you need to hire people who share your company values.
To ensure you get this right, you could even use a recruiting management system to help you make the right hiring decisions.
Why is this important? Well, when an employee’s values are in alignment with those of the company, they feel invested in their work and therefore make an emotional commitment to your organization.
Employee engagement increases when they know that they are making a difference and working towards a common goal.
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When it comes to sustaining motivation and productivity amongst your workforce, consider how much autonomy you give your employees. Are they given space to manage their own workload, make decisions about their role, or even about when and where they work?
Of course, employees need direction and clear boundaries, but fostering a degree of workplace autonomy ensures that your employees feel valued and trusted to carry out their duties.
Acknowledging that each employee has unique preferences and work styles will allow them to work at their best, and increase your employee engagement levels. 💡
4. Set clear expectations ✅
Fostering workplace autonomy is certainly important, but as we touched on above, it is essential to set clear boundaries and expectations with your employees.
Employees who are uncertain about their roles and responsibilities will inevitably feel disconnected from your organization.
Set clear expectations about responsibilities, deadlines, and standards of work. When people know exactly what is expected of them, they are more motivated to meet those expectations and engage positively with their responsibilities.
5. Establish open lines of communication ✅
Clearly, it is important to communicate openly to your employees about your expectations.
However, to promote employee engagement, you need to do more than this. Strategic, two-way communication is part of a healthy company culture.
Open lines of communication with your employees help build trust. Keep your workforce informed on business decisions or plans, and share both good and bad news with them. In doing so, employees feel connected to your organization and are therefore more engaged.
Don’t forget that successful communication goes both ways. Create an open-door policy and encourage employees to communicate honestly and openly with you too.
Employee engagement increases if employees feel heard and understood.
6. Involve employees in decision-making ✅
You’ll understand by now that a major element of a successful employee engagement strategy is to make your employees feel valued. Another way to do this is to involve your employees in company decisions.
Allowing your workforce to have a say on what goes on in the business keeps them engaged, as they have some ownership over their actions and initiatives.
For example, you might invite your employees to an online meeting entitled “call center software UK” to gather their thoughts on which software to invest in. After all, your employees are often the ones who know your business and your customers better than anyone else.
7. Employee recognition ✅
Employee recognition is another fundamental aspect that can help you enhance employee engagement – and it’s easy to understand why.
Intrinsic motivation and personal goals are both important factors when it comes to employee engagement levels, so make sure you keep your eyes peeled and notice anything particularly valuable that your employees are doing.
Perhaps, a customer has mentioned a certain member of staff in a glowing 5-star review? Or maybe, one member of your contact center team has made more sales discovery calls than anyone else this month?
Taking time to recognize the good work that is going on in your organization is essential, as it encourages employees to work to their potential and increases employee engagement. 💡
While a simple “thank you” or “well done” can go a long way, you would benefit from going a little further. You can highlight specific achievements and individual efforts in a number of ways, such as:
Verbal praise
Written notes or emails
Formal recognition at a company meeting or event
A special section on your website
Highlight employee achievements in your company newsletter
Spotlight your employees on your social media channels
Moreover, implementing a system with online badges can add an extra layer of recognition. These badges can be awarded for various achievements and displayed on employees’ profiles, fostering a sense of accomplishment and pride within the organization.
However you decide to recognize the achievements of your employees, ensure you are sincere.
Show your genuine gratitude and your employees will be motivated to keep up their good work.
8. Offer incentives ✅
Recognizing your employee’s achievements need not be a costly strategy.
Having said that, offering incentives can be a highly effective tool to motivate employees and increase engagement.
Incentives are used to acknowledge and reward individual employees or teams for their efforts, and can be both motivating and fulfilling for your workforce.
Incentives could include:
Public recognition. As we discussed in the previous section, publicly acknowledging the efforts of your employees can be a powerful motivator.
Monetary rewards. This could be in the form of a bonus, a pay rise, or vouchers for a fancy dinner.
Professional development opportunities. You might have a limited budget or availability for professional development, and offering those opportunities to high performers can be enough to motivate employees who want to take the next step in their careers.
Time. Offering some additional time off such as an extra day off, or even an early finish, can be hugely motivating for those employees who value work-life balance.
There are many other incentives you could offer your employees, and these will vary depending on the type of organization and the people you employ. 💡
Why not ask your employees what sort of incentives they would like to see in your organization?
9. Offer opportunities for growth and development ✅
Providing opportunities for professional growth and development is another powerful engagement tool. Not only are you investing in the future of your company, but you show your workforce that you value them professionally.
Professional development opportunities may vary from business to business, but you could:
Offer a formal training and development pathway for career progression
Bring in external organizations to provide training opportunities
Support employees to achieve certification or qualifications
Research shows that 86% of employees would leave their jobs if they had an opportunity for more growth elsewhere.
Offering opportunities for career advancement and professional development will not only increase engagement but can improve your employee retention levels and drive better outcomes for your business.
10. Prioritize employee wellbeing ✅
All of the above employee engagement strategies will only work if you treat your workforce like people, not just employees.
Of course, focusing on the productivity and effectiveness of your employees at work is essential, but it’s vital that you recognize the importance of their well-being too.
Treat your employees with respect and understanding. Show that you care about them on a human level and not just as a number on your payroll.
Understanding that your employees have a life outside of your organization can go a long way to drive employee engagement.
This can be as simple as showing genuine compassion when an employee is going through something personal.
Or, you can schedule regular well-being workshops for your employees, to allow them time to focus on themselves and their health.
When your employees are “well” in every sense of the word, their ability to perform at work increases significantly.
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Imagine a workplace where employees are striving to meet and exceed expectations, are communicating effectively with each other and their managers, and are regularly involved in making decisions about their place of work.
Those are engaged employees. 💙
Prioritizing employee engagement can have a huge impact on the overall success of your business.
When you invest in your employees, listen to what they have to say, and genuinely care about their well-being and their success, you will quickly see why employee engagement is crucial for your business.
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